Delivery services (also known as courier services, mail services, and shipping services), such as those offered by the U.S. Postal Service and commercial carriers provide delivery and pickup of letters, packages, and parcels (hereinafter referred to as “packages”) to and from residences and businesses across the country. Typically, such services operate in hub and spoke architecture.
A typical nationwide or international delivery service maintains a large fleet of vehicles. Such vehicles include airplanes and semi-trailer trucks to move packages between hubs and spokes, and smaller vehicles for the “last mile” from spoke endpoints to delivery destinations (for example a home or business). Between them, the two largest commercial delivery services in the U.S. operate over 100,000 last mile vehicles—each of which requires a human operator. In some situations, some interaction with a person at pickup or delivery is desired, for example for proof of delivery, for payment on delivery (also known as “cash on delivery” or “COD”), or payment of delivery costs on pickup. The growth of business-to-consumer e-commerce, online shopping for example, is expected to continue to increase the demand for delivery services, and hence the need for capacity and efficiency in the last mile.